Making appropriate decisions about admission to critical care: The role of critical care outreach and medical emergency teams

摘要

The numbers of patients admitted to critical care exceeds 130000 a year in the UK, and one in six patients will die there (ICNARC, 2013). Critical illness episodes can often become transition points for patients, where intentions of medical treatment are questioned and can change from curative to palliative when patients are critically or acutely unwell. The impetus for making decisions regarding treatment in a patient's illness trajectory is often prompted by the onset of critical illness. This is particularly so in the case of chronic health conditions where an acute exacerbation or event might require an admission to a critical care unit.